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Saenuri Party leader Kim Moo-sung speaks at a policy debate on online portals at the National Assembly

As the Constitutional Court said in 2002 when it struck down Article 53 of the Telecommunications Business Act as being unconstitutional, the Internet is “considered the most participatory market and the medium that most promotes expression.” Because of this characteristic, the Internet is regarded as being a space that is harder for political forces to control than the traditional media.

But last year the administration of President Park Geun-hye initiated a bundle of policies related to internet news and to the public sphere, prompting concerns that the government, which already dominates broadcasters, is tightening its grip on the Internet, too.

The so-called “portal report” released in Sep. 2015 by the Youido Institute, a think tank affiliated with the ruling Saenuri Party, triggered a concerted attack on supposed bias in the news services offered by portal sites. This incident is mentioned as one of the clearest examples of the government’s efforts to take control of the Internet.

One of the most notable measures taken last year in regard to the Internet and the public sphere was the government’s revision of the implementation order of the Newspaper Act, which toughened the requirements for official registration by online newspapers. Another was a large-scale reorganization of the news services at portal sites, which constitute the largest distribution network for news online.

While online newspapers had formerly been required to have three reporters and editors in order to register with the government, the revised rules increased this to at least five full-time reporters and editors.

Meanwhile, Naver and Kakao, major online portals, set up the News Partner Assessment Board, which hires external organizations to assess the legitimacy of the partner companies who provide the portals with news and search services. Both portals said that the main reason for creating the board was to deal with bogus news sites.

These recent measures did not appear out of the blue, of course. Considering that they are intricately connected with the interests not only of the government and media but also of companies and advertisers operating online, it would be unwise to assume that they were directly influenced by the wishes of political forces.

Nevertheless, measures of this sort have their own synergy, which has led to concerns that they will turn the sphere of discourse online into a market that is solely oriented around the news of established newspapers that belong to the “discourse complex.”

One example of this is the decision by the portals’ News Partner Assessment Board to limits its certification of news partners to internet newspapers that are officially registered with the government in accordance with the Newspaper Act.

If this standard is implemented, it is very likely that the small-scale media companies that guarantee the diversity of public opinion will disappear from the news services offered by the major portals and that the views of media companies that already exert a huge influence through newspapers and broadcasters will come to dominate the Internet as well.

Portal sites are responding to ongoing accusations from political groups about fairness by turning to “mechanical neutrality,” but this will only strengthen the influence of the discourse complex online, some say.

At present, the news services on the portals take most of their articles from Yonhap News and other wire services. Indeed, news on the portal sites largely consists not of critical articles, which could open the portals to attack by political groups, but of breaking news articles, which achieves a sort of mechanical neutrality.

While the portals are countering accusations about fairness with market logic, explaining that they employ algorithms to provide “customized content,” there are also concerns that the very idea of “algorithmic journalism” runs counter to the goal of maintaining a diverse public discourse. Adding the fact that the major media outlets hardly run any articles that are critical of the government, such articles have become harder to find on portals’ news pages.

Troublingly, the Park administration has showed an interest in using regulatory bodies to meddle not only in internet news but also in private communications.

Last year, the Korea Communications Standards Commission (KCSC) revised its rules for communications review to allow not only defamed parties but also third parties to file complaints about online defamation. In addition, the Press Arbitration Commission submitted a draft revision to the Press Arbitration Act that would make it possible not only for the original text of articles but also comments and reposted versions of articles to be the subject of arbitration.

The number of posts that portals and other websites have arbitrarily blocked at the request of one party has also rapidly increased, from about 140,000 in 2010 to about 450,000 in 2014.

“As can be seen from the government and the ruling party’s obsession with the anti-terror bill, which would allow the government to engage in more surveillance of people’s private lives, what stands out about the Park Geun-hye administration is its efforts to exert more control not only over media companies and other businesses but even the private conversations of individuals,” said Kim Dong-won, chief of policy for the National Union of Media Workers.

By Choi Won-hyung, staff reporter

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